In the King's Service (14 page)

“In Llannedd, Madam?” Alyce dared to ask.

Richeldis inclined her head. “Ladies destined for noble husbands must learn reading and writing and ciphering as well as the domestic arts necessary for running a great lord’s household. I hope you will make the most of your time there. Jessamy’s daughter will befriend you, I’m sure.”

“But, she’s a
nun,
” Marie said doubtfully.

“That’s true,” Richeldis agreed, smiling, “but she isn’t a very
old
nun; I’ve met her. Not so many years ago, she was a girl just like you. Do give her a chance—both of you. You will need a friend there.”

The slight waver in the queen’s final words reminded Alyce that Deryni like herself and Marie would, indeed, need a friend within the constricted atmosphere of convent life, and she bowed her head briefly.

“I shall miss the children,” she said quietly.

“And they shall miss
you,
” Richeldis replied. “And
I
shall miss you!” She rolled her eyes in mock exasperation. “In truth, I almost envy you. Most of my other ladies are
decades
older than I. Your presence at court has taken me back to more carefree days of my own girlhood.”

“It has?” Marie said, brightening.

“It has!” The queen hugged the younger girl briefly around the shoulders and smiled. “You’d best be off now. I’m sure you’ll wish to take a few things with you. And it will be an early start in the morning, I’m sure. The king wastes no time, once he’s made a decision.”

 
 
THAT night, the two of them supped in the nursery with Jessamy and her children, after which Jessamy helped them select what to pack for the morrow. Later, when huddled beneath their sleeping furs and coverlets in the bed they shared, the sisters conferred about the future.

“What will it be like, do you think?” Marie whispered. “Will the nuns be very strict?”

“I don’t know,” Alyce admitted. “But Lady Megory says that Tante Jessamy’s daughter likes it there.”

Marie’s snort managed to convey both acknowledgement and skepticism.

“I don’t want to wear a habit!” she said after a short silence.

“Well, we must,” Alyce replied. “Think of it as camouflage, so that we’ll blend in with the other girls,” she added. “But Tante Jessamy says we don’t have to wear the wimple.”

“Thank God for that!” Marie retorted. “What do you suppose they’ll teach us?”

“Not what we’d like to learn, I’ll warrant!” Alyce said with a snicker. “Father wants us to learn lady-things, like fine needlework. And I think he hopes that Tante Jessamy will teach us some of the other things we do want to learn.”

“She has to be careful, though,” Marie said. “Even with the king as her patron, she daren’t be open about what she is.”

“No, and we mustn’t be, either,” Alyce replied. “Promise me you’ll be discreet, Mares.”

“I’ll certainly try,” Marie agreed. “Oh, Alyce, what’s to become of us?”

Alyce merely hugged her sister close, for there was no answer to that question. Come the morrow, they would know all too well, for better or for worse.

 
 
ALYCE had feared she would not sleep at all, as visions of what might be danced behind her closed eyelids, but all too soon, Mistress Anjelica was shaking her to wakefulness, a candle in her hand.

“Wake you now, little ones,” she murmured. “You’ll want something warm in your stomachs before you ride out into the cold. At least it looks to be a fine day dawning.”

It was, indeed, a fine day, once the sun came up—bright and sunny, if very cold. The king had assigned a ginger-haired young knight called Sir Jiri Redfearn to escort them, along with half a dozen of the household guard. Jessamy had decided to bring along her nine-year-old, for a surprise visit with her sister. A maid also rode with them, for they would stay the night in the convent’s guest house, and a manservant to manage the single pack horse.

Their little cavalcade was on its way not long after first light, wending its way northward along the east bank of the river, past the seminary called Arx Fidei, and then into the foothills. They rode slowly, perhaps in deference to Jessamy, for though fit enough, she was of an age to be mother of all of them save the maid and the manservant.

The short winter day was drawing to a close as their party crested a hill and came, at last, within sight of the convent’s bell tower. The gold of the dying sun kissed the snow before the barred convent gates, and shone in rainbow shimmers on the mist beginning to rise as the day’s warmth faded and the shadows lengthened. As they picked their way down that last slope toward the entrance, a bell was ringing out one of the afternoon offices.

“There it is, my dears,” Jessamy announced. “Notre Dame d’Arc-en-Ciel, the royal convent of our Lady of the Rainbow. The order began in Bremagne, did you know?”

When both her young charges shook their heads, Jessamy continued affably.

“Well, then. Its foundation dates back several centuries, to the site of a very ancient holy well now contained within the grounds of the Mother House at Fessy, near Remigny. The well had long been a place of popular devotion, perhaps even pre-Christian, but one spring afternoon, after a very emphatic rain shower, an apparition of our Blessed Lady appeared from within a rainbow. It was witnessed by three young girls of noble family who had stopped to pray for a sign regarding whom they should wed.”

“What kind of an apparition?” Marie wanted to know. “What did it look like?”

“Well, it’s said that our Lady appeared as a young woman little older than yourselves,” Jessamy replied, “arrayed in a sky-blue robe and veil and clasping a rainbow around her shoulders like a shining mantle. No one knows precisely what she told them, but within two or three years, they had gained the support of the Archbishop of Remigny and had persuaded the king to give them a generous endowment of land just outside the city, where they established a convent for the domestic education of young ladies of gentle birth.

“For their habit, they adopted the pale blue of the apparition’s robes, with a white wimple and a band of rainbow edging to the veil. The vowed sisters wear it on a blue veil, and also on the bottom of the scapular—which is a sort of tabard or apron—and novices take a white veil with rainbow edging, but you’ll wear neither—though you
will
wear the blue habit. Those who come for the school do not take binding vows, of course. Like you, they come for finishing as proper ladies, though some do stay—which you will not. But this will be a sheltered place for you to spend your next few years. I promise I shall stay in touch regularly.”

They had reached the convent gate by now, whose arch displayed a rainbow picked out in mosaic tiles, and Jessamy bent to pull a tasseled rope that rang a bell within. Almost immediately, a tiny aperture opened at eye-level and a pair of hazel eyes peered out.

“Blessings upon all who come in peace,” a musical voice said. “How may I assist you?”

“I am Lady Jessamy MacAthan, mother of Sister Iris Jessilde, and I bring two new students seeking refuge beneath the Rainbow,” Jessamy said easily.

“Under our Lady’s grace, all who seek shall find such refuge,” the voice replied. “A moment, if you please.”

The aperture closed, they heard the sounds of thumping, of metal against metal as a bar was withdrawn, and then a wicket gate opened in the larger door, just high enough for a single rider to enter, crouched down. Drawing aside, Jessamy nodded to her daughter, who urged her pony through the opening, then gestured for Alyce and Marie to follow. Except by special permission, men were not permitted within the walls of Arc-en-Ciel, so their escort would retire to lodgings in the nearby village for the night. Meanwhile, Jessamy and the maid followed behind Alyce, Marie, and Jesiana, and the servant with the pack horse gave its lead over to a nun who led it through the doorway.

Inside, Jesiana was already off her pony and hurtling toward a slight figure in blue robes and the rainbow-edged white veil of a novice. Three more blue-robed women were waiting a little beyond, on the bottom step leading up to the chapel door, all wearing the sky-blue veil of professed sisters. The one in the center, a handsome woman of indeterminate years, also wore a silver pectoral cross.

“Welcome back to Arc-en-Ciel, dear Jessamy,” she said quietly, holding out both her hands in greeting. “And these must be the two demoiselles of whom you wrote.”

“They are, Reverend Mother,” Jessamy replied, dismounting. “And thank you for meeting us in person.”

She went and bent to kiss the woman’s hand and then embrace her. Alyce and Marie also got down from their ponies, coming shyly forward as Jessamy beckoned.

“Mother, these are Alyce and Marie de Corwyn, daughters of the Earl of Lendour,” Jessamy said, with a sweep of her hand. “Girls, this is Mother Iris Judiana, in whose charge you will be for the next several years.”

Dutifully Alyce and Marie came forward to dip in pretty curtsies and kiss the mother superior’s hand, earning them a faint smile of apparent approval.

“I bid you welcome, dear daughters,” said Iris Judiana. “Sister Iris Rose will take you to the robing room, where you may clothe yourselves in the habit of our order. We shall meet you in the chapel shortly, where you will be enrolled beneath the Rainbow. Jessamy, I believe your Jesiana has already gone with her sister to the parlor. You are welcome to join them for a few minutes, if you wish, while the girls prepare themselves. I believe you know the way.”

“Yes, Mother, thank you.”

With a nod to the mother superior and a wink to Alyce and Marie, Jessamy hurried off in the direction her daughter had disappeared. At the same time, the novice called Iris Rose gave the newcomers a shy smile and indicated that they should follow, conducting her charges silently into the cloister enclosure. Passage along a short stretch of corridor paved with encaustic tiles in cream and blue brought them at last to an arched door whose rounded door case had been painted like a rainbow.

“In here, please,” Iris Rose murmured, finally speaking, as she opened the door and stood aside to let them enter.

The robing room was cozy and warm, near to the parlor where visitors were received, and had its own fireplace and several screens to provide for the modesty of those who used it. Several robes of pale blue wool were laid out on a table before the fire, along with a folded stack of white wool under-gowns and a pair of cinctures plaited of different-colored cords of rainbow hues. Fingering the lining of a dark blue mantle draped over a corner of one of the screens, Alyce decided that the fur was rabbit, or possibly squirrel. Not so sumptuous as the fox-lined cloaks she and Marie wore at present, but clearly the sisters of the rainbow did not intend their votaries to freeze to death.

“May I assist you with those?” Iris Rose asked, lifting tentative hands toward the cloak Alyce had started to unfasten at the throat. “Oh,’tis heavy as well!”

She hugged the cloak against her body as she gathered up its folds, letting out a faint sigh as her appreciative gaze took in the fine gown of forest green wool beneath, and the deep blue one that Marie wore.

“Ah, me, I fear our habits are not nearly so elegant as the gowns to which you must be accustomed,” she sighed. “But we believe they are pleasing to our Lady,” she added, lifting her chin in faint challenge for Alyce to say otherwise.

“No, I’m sure the habits are quite suitable,” Alyce said diplomatically, as she picked up one of the blue gowns and held it against herself to measure its length.

“You’ll find several different lengths and sizes to choose from,” Iris Rose said helpfully. “We never know what our new postulants will look like.”

“We aren’t postulants,” Marie said briskly, shaking out one of the under-gowns. “We’ve come as students.”

“Oh, of course you have,” Iris Rose said lightly. “Please forgive me. I didn’t mean to imply that you’re expected to make vows. I suppose it’s the habit of the habit.” She essayed a tentative grin.

“You
will
be asked to promise that you’ll abide by the rules governing the school, that you’ll be obedient to the direction of Mother Superior and the sisters in charge of you, but that doesn’t bind you from leaving, when your guardians determine that it’s time for you to go. Surely someone told you that?”

Alyce made herself relax a little and began removing her outer garments, deciding that she liked Iris Rose. Though the other girl appeared to be a few years older than she and Marie, her carriage suggested gentle breeding—though perhaps that came of the convent education. With care, Alyce thought she might be able to find out more about what would be expected of her here; and it was always good to have a friend.

“Oh, of course we were told,” she said, touching the other girl’s hand in reassurance, though she did not yet dare to try establishing any kind of Deryni link. “My sister has heard too many horror tales of girls locked up in convents against their will. Tante Jessamy assured us that this is not the case at Arc-en-Ciel. In fact, she told us that her daughter has been quite happy here—though I must confess, we’ve not met her. I assume that you know Sister Iris Jessilde. . . .”

“Oh, we all know Iris Jessilde.” Iris Rose grinned, her brown eyes taking on a new animation. “She can be
so
funny—and she’s quite the accomplished embroideress. Very pious, too. But—how can it be that you’ve not met her? Is she not your cousin, if Lady Jessamy is your aunt?”

“Well, I suppose she
would
be our cousin,” Marie said, from within the folds of outer gown she was pulling off over her head. “But Tante Jessamy isn’t really our aunt. She and our mother were like sisters, so we’ve always
called
her Tante Jessamy—”

“We only came to Rhemuth in the autumn, so we don’t even know Tante Jessamy very well,” Alyce said, picking up one of the white wool under-gowns. “Before last summer, we hadn’t seen her for years.”

“Oh,” said Iris Rose. “Well, I know that Jessilde went home last spring for her father’s funeral, but obviously you weren’t there yet. So, where
did
you come from? You don’t sound local.”